Nvidia Shield Available For Pre-Orders Starting May 20

Nvidia has dropped the word "project" from the name of its Tegra 4-powered Android handheld, announcing that pre-orders for the device will begin in less than week. The price is just a little higher than we were expecting, though.

The Shield will cost interested gamers $349. Nvidia should be concerned about the price points for the PlayStation 4 and next Xbox, especially since the Shield cannot natively run games like a Surface tablet or Razer's Edge (both of which are also considerably more expensive). Instead, the Shield will use its own app store (called TegraZone) and the Google Play store.

Nvidia is hoping to hook owners of its GeForce GTX video cards by offering the ability to stream play from the PC to the Shield. Nvidia is also hoping that the inclusion of Double Fine's Broken Age and Costume Quest in the TegraZone library will show support from developers and garner consumer interest. Whether that market is big enough (or interested enough) remains to be seen.